Forum:2019-07-12 (Friday)
Discussion for comic for . The wiki pages don't just write themselves, join in on the fun. ---- Heh. Agatha's grandmother finally gets mentioned by name in the comic. I wonder if Agatha would have recognized that, if she hadn't had more pressing issues occupying her attention. And thank you, Foglios, for not dragging out this latest kidnapping for very long. --Geoduck42 (talk) 04:40, July 12, 2019 (UTC) : Good catch. I had to look her up to find out what you were talking about. (Handy, this wiki.) If she's the patron saint of those who fall afoul of sparks, does that mean Seffie is talking about Tweedle falling afoul of himself? :-) Bkharvey (talk) 07:07, July 12, 2019 (UTC) ::Well, he definitely ran afoul of Agatha, directly and indirectly. --Fred1740 (talk) 09:53, July 12, 2019 (UTC) Guess he's getting better. His body hair is coming back. heteromeles :Not only that, he regrew his left hand! --Fred1740 (talk) 12:39, July 12, 2019 (UTC) ::Oh, good eye! Have you reported it? That's the kind of thing they fix when told about it. Bkharvey (talk) 21:11, July 12, 2019 (UTC) Agatha is really catching on slow here. We all understood right away why Tweedle's here! And Agatha has more reason than we to get it. ➤ : Give her a break. She's had a rough few months, and she was drugged until thirty seconds ago. We've had two days (probably mostly undrugged) to think about it. Argadi (talk) 09:13, July 12, 2019 (UTC) :: I'll give you the rough few months (rough entire life, really), but it didn't take us two days. More like two seconds. Bkharvey (talk) 09:49, July 12, 2019 (UTC) What are we to make of Dimo's contribution? Is he threatening violence? Does he understand that Tweedle means messing around with their bodies as the mistake, rather than coming to England (and kidnapping Agatha, which is what brought the rest of the gang here)? ➤ : I'd classify it under snappy comeback instead of a specific threat. Argadi (talk) 09:13, July 12, 2019 (UTC) ::Dimo is a Jaeger. Threatening is his default setting. 10:57, July 12, 2019 (UTC) : Plainly a threat. Almost certainly for the short-term offense of kidnapping the Heterodyne. Look at the posture of all 5 (Higgs, Dimo, Violetta, Thorpe, Bear): that's an upset posse. And Jaegers do seem to use "Sveethot" when talking to someone they're inclined to punch first, ask questions later ... Scientician (talk) 04:44, July 13, 2019 (UTC) Zeetha, Wooster, and Rakethorn still MIA. ➤ :And Oggie and Maxim. --Fred1740 (talk) 09:53, July 12, 2019 (UTC) ::There's no immediate reason for the two Englishmen to be here. Zeetha and the two Jaegers, tho, really shouldn't have wandered off. --Geoduck42 (talk) 10:38, July 12, 2019 (UTC) :::They're checking out the perimeter. Dimo, Higgs, Krosp and his Bear, and Violetta are with Agatha. Isn't that enough? --Fred1740 (talk) 21:12, July 12, 2019 (UTC) :::: If they're checking the perimeter, they're doing a really lousy job of it, both the Baron/Trelawney duo and Seffie's group got past them. More likely they're in the kitchen stuffing their faces. --Geoduck42 (talk) 05:22, July 13, 2019 (UTC) ::::: Maxim and Oggie, sure. But I would guess that Zeetha is enough of a pro to know when she can take time off and when she can't. I suppose we'll find out. Bkharvey (talk) 07:17, July 13, 2019 (UTC) :::::: No, Zeetha is still young and inexperienced, and does tactically stupid things: "They're looking for the Wasp Eater!!" Gleefully glomping Higgs when he turns up in the Societt Dome. --Geoduck42 (talk) 15:22, July 13, 2019 (UTC) I hope things slow down enough soon for Violetta to get some clothes. Among other things, my nasty suspicious mind is wondering what delayed effects the drug Sparafucile used on Agatha might have, for which Violetta might need an antidote. ➤ :Sparafucile didn't poison Agatha, Seffie very explicitly needs her alive to keep Tweedle from dying. --Geoduck42 (talk) 10:38, July 12, 2019 (UTC) :Seffie might want to Tarvek to distract Agatha ("win, wed and bed her") so that she can do the same with Gil ... but I don't think harming Agathe is on her agenda. The blowback if that got back to Gil (her idée fixe) would be ... extreme. Scientician (talk) 04:58, July 13, 2019 (UTC) I also hope Attorney Tarvek shows up in time to conduct the negotiations about what Tweedle will give Agatha in trade for her continued assistance at keeping him alive. Bkharvey (talk) 07:03, July 12, 2019 (UTC) :Tarvek and Gil are next to arrive on the scene. --Fred1740 (talk) 09:53, July 12, 2019 (UTC) In the probability zero prediction department, I find myself hoping that Vapnoople doesn't show up and decide to try to force his "two apprentices" (Agatha and Tweedle) to make nice together or something more icky. That would be tacky. In the Probability Infinitesimally Close To Zero Prediction department, once Tarvek and Gil arrive on the scene (and especially if Zeetha pops up), we'll have critical mass, with all the major protagonists in one place at one time, which may result in something REALLY SIGNIFICANT happening, like a portal opening to Egypt or some such. Hopefully Zeetha stays away to avoid criticality. heteromeles : Nothing that dramatic, but if Bang shows up also, all this relationship stuff (both senses, family and romance) might get out in the open. As for portals, my guess is that nobody's leaving England until Dim and Snacky are squared away. Bkharvey (talk) 21:19, July 12, 2019 (UTC) : I figured that Dim and Snacky are tesseracted away, unless the Foglios choose to bring either of them back as leveled-up monsters some time later, when Agatha's dealing more directly with the Mechanicsburg Temporal Anomaly. The mystery I'm still confused about is (are) Prende's lantern and whether anything came in on that Sub of the Dead, or whether someone just offed everybody on the sub, left with Prende's Lantern, hijacked another ship, and still made it into England. Why go to all that work, when the Lantern would be useful anywhere in Europa? Unless the Other has a bunch of wasps hidden around for a snap takeover of the kingdom and Madwa wants to make that, erm, time-critical, there's some element I'm missing about why the Lantern needs to be in the kingdom at all. heteromeles :: I don't know why it has to be in England, other than that that's where Agatha is. My not-entirely-mad theory is that, since the Lantern lets the bearer move around doing things while time freezes for everyone else, it's what's going to let Agatha enter Mechanicsburg and destroy Klaus's bomb. Bkharvey (talk) 22:06, July 12, 2019 (UTC) ::Yes, but Gil was already wormholing into Mechanicsburg with all sorts of equipment, so the Lantern isn't unique or vital. Still, I think you've got a point that I hadn't considered. I'd figured the re-taking of Mechanicsburg would be the penultimate act of the series, with the defeat of the Other being the ultimate act (or vice versa, with Mechanicsburg standing in for the Shire in the "Scouring of" ending). The only reason I thought that is that I figured Agatha would want to stay in and rebuild Mechanicsburg after she got the idiots out of it, and that would more-or-less end the series. There's no reason that Agatha can't get Mechanicsburg safed, only to get booted/kidnapped/go questing out/whatever and leave it again, possibly multiple times. I still think that Agatha finding her father (wonder if he's also named Chump?) is an important event, and that dealing with her Mother/the Other is almost certainly the climax of the series. Since the Foglios seem to be moving this along at something like a 10:1 time dilation, and they've given us a less than 2 year deadline for dealing with Mechanicsburg, any conceivable last-minute save of Mechanicsburg would be somewhere off in the middle 2030s on our calendar. I hope they live that long. heteromeles I wonder whether Seffie's invocation of Saint Teodora is just a meaningless formal speech, like saying "Gezundheit" when someone sneezes even if you're an atheist Jew like me, or whether she actually feels some obligation to the saint -- or to her granddaughter, both for being her granddaughter and for her role in saving Tweedle. It would be extremely interesting if she became a good guy, or even ambivalent. Bkharvey (talk) 23:18, July 12, 2019 (UTC) :Or just a reference for sharp-eyed fans to catch. The Patron Saint of those who have run afoul of Sparks is a good one as Martellus certainly has run afoul of a major Spark. Good or Evil isn't really useful in this comic. Many characters are morally gray - Agatha has killed directly and indirectly and not exactly in pure self defense nor has she moralized about it. Only her father, Bill, seems to have been Lawful Dull er Good. The novel has him depressed if he kills, even a nasty villain. Klaus has maintained the peace but has his dark side. --Fred1740 (talk) 00:37, July 13, 2019 (UTC) :: Klaus has maintained the peace by means of his dark (sadistic) side, a classic sublimation, like becoming a surgeon. It comes out in his "research" too. But Agatha's killing is always in defense of someone, isn't it? I mean, yes, if you look at every detail of everyone's life, we all do bad things, but only some of us do bad things as a career. (Bang is an interesting example, subordinating her sadism to the needs of the Empire.) Up to now, have we ever seen Seffie doing a good thing from a good motive? (So, not counting rescuing Agatha from Gil, for example. That was self-interested.) (Self-and-brother-interested.) Bkharvey (talk) 00:45, July 13, 2019 (UTC) Ping... : > Not only that, he regrew his left hand! --Fred1740 (talk) 12:39, July 12, 2019 (UTC) :: > Oh, good eye! Have you reported it? That's the kind of thing they fix when told about it. Bkharvey (talk) 21:11, July 12, 2019 (UTC) :: So what is the protocol/method to report something? There are 1 or 2 typos / grammar errors that I'd like to report before they get started on publishing the next volume. Scientician (talk) 22:26, July 13, 2019 (UTC) ::: The contact page on the web site says e-mail webmistress@studiofoglio.com . Argadi (talk) 22:56, July 13, 2019 (UTC) ::: You should report them as they come up; sometimes they correct the online version. Bkharvey (talk) 01:37, July 14, 2019 (UTC) It just occurred to me: If five Agatha-hunters arrived at the same moment, this suggests that their search technique wasn't very well planned out. Bkharvey (talk) 00:59, July 14, 2019 (UTC) : They were following the scent trail. No need to split up and search. --Geoduck42 (talk) 01:15, July 14, 2019 (UTC) :: Oh yeah, good point. (But in that case, Tarvek and Gil might take longer to catch up.) Bkharvey (talk) 01:37, July 14, 2019 (UTC) :: :: ... But you know, given all the constructs who can follow scents, you'd think that by now the Smoke Knights would have invented a scent-hiding technology. Bkharvey (talk) 23:47, July 14, 2019 (UTC) Next question: A month or two from now, will Honker start turning gray if Agatha doesn't touch him? Bkharvey (talk) 01:41, July 14, 2019 (UTC) You know, what Tweedle did to Agatha has to be illegal. I wonder if Europa has anything like our fairly recent international treaty allowing any country to assume jurisdiction for a crime against humanity. Maybe Albia could just lock Tweedle up for a few decades. (Yes, he'd claim diplomatic immunity, but there isn't really a country for him to be the king of. The closest is the (Gil's) Empire.) (And yeah, I know assaulting and battering one person isn't a crime against humanity, but maybe their treaty is broader. Or maybe Albia doesn't worry about little things like treaties.) Bkharvey (talk) 22:39, July 14, 2019 (UTC) Hey! You don't suppose, do you, that Tweedle actually died, and Seffie needed that machine to reanimate him? That would solve one problem neatly. Bkharvey (talk) 06:14, July 15, 2019 (UTC) Help! Security failure on 3 browsers on links to comic pages from wiki Is something wrong with my net connection, or is this happening for everyone? I get a message about wrong length SSL record. Bkharvey (talk) 03:59, July 15, 2019 (UTC) Edit: Only from some wiki pages. For example, Torchmen, just edited by Geoduck and then by me (just adding a line break before reflist). : The question is why comic links are sometimes https (which fails for me as well) and sometimes http. The GG_link template itself hasn't changed since 2015. Argadi (talk) 10:59, July 15, 2019 (UTC) :: This is likely a fandom.com upgrade. The pages are served with a HTTP header (upgrade-insecure-requests) that causes the browser to translate all http-links to https. It's to avoid mixed-content warnings, and generally improve security; it's usually a good thing. Perhaps not so good in this case, since https seems to be broken on girlgeniusonline.com Malakit (talk) 09:50, July 17, 2019 (UTC)